


Play the record again

by SSAerial



Category: The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bonnie and Damon really do die at the end of Season 5, Brotherly Love, Episode: s03e16 1912, F/M, Gen, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-27
Updated: 2015-05-27
Packaged: 2018-04-01 13:09:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4021018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SSAerial/pseuds/SSAerial
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stefan stood completely still, mouth close to gaping. He was fervently glad at that moment that nobody caught his strange reaction. Right in front of him, in his 1912 glory with a ridiculous top hat, was Damon. Damon, his brother, who had died playing hero while leaving a mess behind in his wake as always. Well, that wasn’t going to happen this time. Not if he had a say in it. Time Travel</p>
            </blockquote>





	Play the record again

**Author's Note:**

> I can’t believe I’m writing this. I just love time travel stories, so interesting to write and read. Hope you enjoy!

Stefan sucked in a deep breathe, stumbling a few steps back as a headache trampled his cranium like a stampede of rampaging elephants. Images and memories of future past overwhelmed him, barraging him in a relentless pace.

 _Katherine not dead, it was a lie – Elena smiling sweetly, so different, so kind – Damon smirking in a daredevil manner, but he’s dead dead_ dead _and nothing can bring him back – Caroline holding him as he shattered at the realization that he was utterly alone, Lexi gone, the past remembered only by him – he was healing, slowly, but he was still broken – blue, bright eyes pleading and begging him to stay, why didn’t he realize what he felt before? – please don’t cry, she’s supposed to be the optimistic one, the happy one, she can’t leave him too-_

_A spell, there was a spell. He could fix this, fix it all. Nobody had to die-_

Gasping as if drowning in water – _pounding against the crypt and trying to scream and dying over and over again_ – Stefan’s eyes blinked rapidly as if the action could ease the pain.

It didn’t.

After many minutes of hyperventilating and throbbing agony, Stefan finally managed to categorize his newfound memories. He could almost hear Caroline nag at him that organizing one’s head is the best way to manage yourself and Stefan couldn’t agree more to that sentiment than now. The pang of loss nearly ripped his heart apart but he ignored it, just as he had for months now.

_Caroline isn’t here to fix everything. He was on his own now._

Shaking his head, he glanced around and was startled to find himself wearing a black, old-fashioned suit. A funeral suit, in fact, an outfit he was sadly acquainted with quite a lot. However, as he inspected his clothes even more, he noted they were more suited at a different time period, not the 21st century.

Whipping his head around, Stefan was dumbstruck when he smelled the all too familiar smoke in the air that one was surrounded by during the industrial times. The sky was gray and gloomy and everywhere he looked, prim and properly dressed people surrounded him, making his nose itch in old thirst which he quickly dismissed. He was in a cemetery from the looks of it, and that niggled a memory he just couldn’t grasp.

If he had to guess, it was around... the early 1900’s?

Stefan shook his head in resignation. _Of course_ his luck led him to a completely different time when he had been aiming right before his brother’s death.

Behind him, a caw jolted him out of his musings. He looked behind him to see a crow, staring at him with beady and too intelligent eyes to be natural.

He felt his insides freeze and suddenly felt weak in the knees.

The crow has always been his brother’s signature tool, his favorite animal to use when it came to spying. If the crow was here than that must mean-

“Have you been eating the relatives again?”

Stefan’s throat hitched.

He hadn’t heard that low baritone in years, _decades_.

Slowly, doing his best to look composed – thank god he had so much practice on the art of lying and acting charming when he needed to be – Stefan braced himself and turned around.

And there Damon Salvatore stood, blue eyes cold but not damn empty which Stefan nearly wept at because it was proof that his older brother really was standing in the flesh before him, alive and well. The older Salvatore fit the description of tall, dark, and handsome completely, a ridiculous top hat resting on top of his still curly raven hair.

“Damon.” He whispered the name like a prayer has been answered, voice hoarse and so full of emotion that it made Damon instantly frown.

“It’s been a long time brother.” Damon said stiffly in a formal tone that didn’t match his personality at all.

 _You have no idea_.

“Almost fifty years.” Stefan remarked, brain finally kicking in when he recalled this rather false fact. “I’m... surprised you’re here.”

Biggest understatement of the century, circumstance wise and, well, everything else.

“And miss the funeral of... what do you call him? _Uncle_ Zachariah?” Damon said in a dry drawl that Stefan was much more familiar with, the icy attitude towards him making Stefan wince.

It was like starting at square one again. Though neither shared the complicated history that Stefan remembered, they had made bygones be bygones after learning about Katherine’s deception until slowly, the animosity between them had all but disappeared by the time Damon died. The Damon staring at him now though still hated him, loathed him even.

_"I will make it an eternity of misery for you.”_

“Damon,” Stefan licked his suddenly dry mouth, praying he won’t screw this chance up. “I know you’re mad at me-”

“Why would I be mad at you Stefan?” Damon cut in frigidly, back erect and piercing blue eyes accusing. “You made me become a vampire and now I walk the world alone drinking other people's blood.”

“I was afraid to lose you-”

“Not only that,” Damon blithely went on, pointedly ignoring him in that aggravating way that made Stefan want to grit his teeth. “You killed our father in cold blood. How do I even know _you_ weren’t the one who killed _Uncle_ Zachariah?”

“I’m not like that anymore.” Stefan protested vehemently. By gods, decades of missing his older brother and here he was resisting the urge to become his murderer.

How typical that their first conversation after half a century of separation and death end up as an argument.

“Well congratulations Stefan.” Damon said scathingly, already in the motion of turning his back. “If you'll excuse me, I'd like to live out my eternal existence as far away from you as possible.”

Damon was starting to _walk away_ and all of Stefan’s self-control went down the drain in a rage of panic.

“WAIT!” Stefan nearly yelled out.

Damon was startled by his sudden cry if the way his body jumped at the unexpectedly loud sound was anything to go by. Damon glanced back with his electric blue eyes wider than before. Stefan clung onto his brother’s brief attention immediately and spoke the first words that came to mind.

“I missed you.” He blurted out without any preamble. He couldn’t even bring himself to feel embarrassed by the blunt sentiment he was spouting out. Decades of aching regret and grief made him realize that holding back has only ever hurt him. Hell, it took him years to finally admit to himself and to Caroline that he loved her and the delay nearly ruined them both. There was no way in hell he was going to make that same mistake again.

So swallowing his pride, he continued with a much steadier tone with Damon’s wide-eyed gaze fixated on him.

“I know you’re mad at me.” He repeated again, hoping against hope Damon would really _listen_. “And I don’t blame you. Everything was my fault, I know that. And I know you’ll never forgive me and I understand that.” He looked down, missing the stunned expression that flitted across the older Salvatore’s face.

“When I killed father, I didn’t mean to do it.” his mouth twisted ruefully. “It doesn’t excuse what I did. But I promise you, that if I had never killed father and was in the right mind, I would’ve chosen to die right alongside you. I never would’ve forced you into this life and I’m so sorry for that. I just couldn’t imagine life without my big brother. I-I _couldn’t_.”

He really couldn’t, he had later came to realize. He nearly self-destructed after Damon died. The only thing that had held him together was Caroline. She had made sure he drank blood and had a semblance of a life. She was the one who convinced him to leave Mystic Falls with her to get away from the memories and live again. Then after she was gone...

Well, nothing was there to stop him from tenaciously finding a way to bring his brother and her back. And that’s when he found the answer:

Time Travel.

He hunted down a witch who, while not as powerful as Bonnie but was still quite formidable, agreed to help him after he paid her a hefty sum of money, blood, and dangerous ingredients that took him forever to find.

And after years of getting the spell to work, he was finally here in the past, just like he had hoped. Only it had been too far back.

But maybe, just maybe, this could be a good thing.

Too many people had died over the years after Damon’s passing.

Liz from cancer. Jeremy from alcohol poisoning (he didn’t take Bonnie’s death _at all_ well). Alaric from old age. Tyler from a bar fight wound. Matt ended up leaving Mystic Falls and Stefan never found out where he had disappeared off to. He couldn’t really blame him after everything that has happened.

Elena, from shattering heartbreak after losing her two best friends, her family, and the man she loved more than immortal life itself. She withered away, the radiant young woman Stefan had first met and loved wilting away into nothing by the end, leaving him as the sole survivor of their once close knit group.

There was no way he was going to let that miserable future happen again. No way in hell.

So Stefan took a brave step forward, encouraged further when Damon did not back away. He looked Damon right in the eye, spring green clashing with crystal blue.

“Please, just... Have a drink with me. Tell me what you’ve been up to. _Stay_.” Stefan closed his eyes, mentally bracing himself even though every part of him screamed not to say it. “If you still don’t want to be around me after today, I will never bother you again. I promise. Just give me a chance.”

And oh, how much it hurt to say that. But he meant it. He would watch and protect Damon from a distance but he’ll never try to talk to him. Not if Damon wanted to.

Damon stared at him as if he’s a drunken induced apparition spouting out impossible admittances that pride had stopped Stefan from ever admitting. It was heartbreaking really how much Damon clearly disbelieved but longed to hope for a chance to have his little brother back as much as Stefan. He saw it in the dark haired vampire’s conflicted eyes.

If only they had done this sooner and had extended the olive branch to each other without pointing fingers at the end. Their stubbornness truly had been their downfall.

In typical Damon-fashion, he finally shrugged with deceptive, lofty casualness and said, “Sure. Why not.”

Stefan smiled, half tempted to laugh and cry.

 _‘I’ll make things right.’_ Stefan thought as he squeezed his brother’s shoulder in silent thanks, determination cementing this vow. _‘I won’t let things fall apart. Never again.’_

_Never again._

**Author's Note:**

> Please review on the way out.


End file.
